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Talk Social: 27 March, 2018

With the clamour to #deletefacebook growing momentum, users who are logging out of the social network for good are discovering that even more of their data was being accessed than they realised.

According to The Guardian, users who request a download of Facebook’s data about them on deactivation of their accounts have been shocked to learn that full logs of calls and texts made and received on their mobile devices have been stored, along with their contacts, calendars and even friends’ birthdays.

Facebook insists that harvesting such data is requested at the outset of an account being set-up and is used to let its algorithm personalise content and prioritise posts from friends.

Snapchat’s popularity as the social network of choice for the young continues to grow.

New research among American social media users shows that Snapchat is only fractionally behind Facebook in the 18-24 year old category, with 78 per cent using Snapchat regularly, compared to 80 per cent on Facebook.

Instagram is next on 71 per cent, with twitter far behind with less than half (45 per cent) of 18-24 year olds using it regularly.

Frequency of use is also very close between Facebook and Snapchat in this age group – 51 per cent say they check the social app several times daily, compared to 49 per cent doing the same on Snapchat.

VR that is able to track a user’s eye movements and replicate them exactly in the form of an avatar is now available.

The tech from a company called Tobii uses cameras inside a VR headset to track every eye movement right down to winks.

The emergence of such tech inside a VR headset also means that the prospect of cameras watching where you are looking, and for how long, won’t be far off being used for advertising and marketing purposes, surely.